Mysterious Matters: Mystery Publishing Demystified

Forum: Nontraditional Narratives

As of today, I have created a new entry category that I am calling a "Forum." 

In a nutshell, I'm hoping that the Forum will encourage readers to answer some questions I have been thinking about and/or respond to some ideas we have been kicking around at the office. 

This is your chance to be heard!  Contrary to what we like to believe, editors don't know everything.  To publish books that people will read (and want to buy), we need to know what people are interested in and what they're sick of.

While comments on the Mysterious Matters blog are always welcome, I am particularly interested in comments on any question I raise in the forum, and I hope you will feel comfortable about posting your honest responses.

Of course, your comments can be anonymous, but it would be helpful if you could provide a bit of background about yourself--specifically: Are you a reader or a writer?  What types of mysteries do you typically like?  And if you are a librarian, it would be great to know that (and whether you speak regarding your personal tastes or those of your reading public).

Today's forum question:  My colleagues and I were talking about our enjoyment of nontraditional narratives.  You know--books with multiple viewpoints, unreliable narrators, structural innovations, nonlinear plots, ambiguous endings, and so forth.  Then we got to wondering if we like them simply because they're different...because they offer a welcome diversion from the usual first-person, "I did this, then I did that" story.  How do you feel about nontraditional structures?  Are they fun, challenging, or both?  Do you find that they are more work to read, and do you feel the work is worth the effort?  Do you have to be in the right "mood" to pick up one of these books?  If you're at a bookstore and flipping through a bunch of books, deciding which one to buy, do these tricks or techniques make you more likely to buy the book, or less likely?

I await your thoughts, O Mysterious Ones.

Viva La Revolucion

This is a true story, I swear it:  Many years ago, my elderly mother received a phone call from a marketing company asking her opinion on which Hollywood star should become the spokesperson for beef.  She'd always liked James Garner, so she suggested him.  Imagine her shock a few months later when she saw a TV commercial in which James Garner sang the praises of beef.

There's a term for this type of advertising that's meant to drive demand for a particular class of product rather than a specific brand name.  Over the years I've seen such ads from time to time-- for eggs, for cotton, for apples, and so forth.  I used to think such advertising was inane, but I've changed my mind.  It's time for some advertising that reminds consumers how much enjoyment they can get out of a mystery story.

I don't say this because I work in the field, but every librarian I've ever met has told me that mysteries are some of the most popular books in the library.  As we all know, many films and TV shows have a mysterious element to them, even those that aren't murder mysteries a la Murder She Wrote (one of the most popular shows in the history of television, ahem).  Many children who get hold of mysteries as young readers become lifelong fans.

My point is that people like mysteries.  They may not know they like mysteries, and may not actively seek them out -- but they like them.  So why aren't we media companies giving the people what they want?  And I ask this rhetorical question in the face of the strong reality that many newspapers and magazines are now publishing many fewer book reviews (including mysteries) than they have in the past.  They perceive that there's no advertising revenue to be garnered from such reviewing, so the features go the way of the wind.

This is why I want to call for a media revolution.  Let's say I am the Features Editor at Big City Newspaper (let's call it BCN).  Here's what I'd like to do--perhaps on Sunday, or perhaps one day during the week.  Monday has good alliterative possibilities.  I'd have a "Mysterious Monday" two-page spread, filled with puzzles, mini-mysteries, and brain twisters.  The possibilities are endless:

• Does anyone remember Donald Sobol's Two-Minute Mysteries? Mysterious Monday could feature one of these each week.
• Lawrence Treat had a wonderful series of books titled Crime and Puzzlement, which featured a one-panel cartoon and a brief set-up. Readers had to look closely at the picture, answer the questions, and determine the murderer. My children loved these--and so did many of the adults I know. (I looked all over the Web for one of these to include with this entry, but couldn't fine one.)
• Mysterious Monday could be an excellent venue for original short stories.
• To keep Mysterious Monday multimedia, BCN could also offer a run-down of mysterious films and TV shows scheduled for that week.

As the editor of Mysterious Monday at BCN, I'd have no lack of novelists wanting to contribute (for free), since their contributions would drive awareness of and interest in their books.  I'd have more content than I knew what to do with.  AND...as the feature became more popular, I would certainly bring in plenty of advertising revenue from publishers and other mysterious purveyors seeking to sell mystery-related merchandise. 

Of course, Mystery Scene magazine provides a wealth of mysterious goings-on in each and every issue, but it is written mostly for the hardcore fan, who subscribes as a result of a conscious love of the mysterious.  I'm proposing a more wide-ranging media revolution--similar to the ads designed to get me to eat more beef and eggs--that would create more mystery fans, or at least tap into their already existing enjoyment of mystery.  Are there any intrepid newspaper columnists reading this blog entry who'll take the idea to their editors?

Surreal Moments

A friend of mine tells a story of being in a bookstore and saying to his wife, "Oh look, [insert famous author's name here] has a new book out."  At which point a woman standing near him jumped about 10 feet, made brief eye contact with him, then bolted away.  It wasn't until later in the visit that he realized that the woman whose peace he'd disturbed was actually Famous Author herself.

In other words, how odd it must be to be in a public place and to hear a complete stranger speaking your name. 

I had this experience myself this past weekend--but with regard to my alias, Agatho.  I was scoping out the shelves of a fairly well-known mystery bookstore, trying to suss out what the competition is doing, looking for interesting new titles and/or cover design, and so forth. 

As I was checking out the hardcovers near the cash register, I heard bits of a conversation along the following lines.

"...Mysterious matters.... blog...editor?  Publisher?....yes... No, who knows...Oh, yes... interesting...Agatho?  What's that all about?"

All those words together in one conversation piqued my interest, so I subtly moved closer to listen in.  Yes, it turned out that these mystery folk (one of whom is a mystery writer) were indeed talking about this blog and saying (mostly) good things about it.  The most fun part was listening to speculation regarding my identity, with one person proclaiming that beyond a shadow of a doubt my identity is XXXX XXXXX.  The others nodded sagely, convinced that they'd solved the mystery. 

But I am not XXXX XXXXX.  I am, however, flattered to have been mistaken for him.  And I adored hiding in plain sight, eavesdropping on a conversation about me; and I also quite enjoyed hearing Mysterious Matters discussed, dissected, complimented, and (yes) slightly criticized. 

So that was surreal moment #1.  Surreal moment #2 came this morning by way of an Internet post which my assistant somehow uncovered.  In it, a writer mentioned me by name in a complimentary way, saying that more than any other person, I'd given her the best feedback she'd ever received on her work.  Following my suggestions, she'd revised her work, submitted it to an agent, and gotten a contract with a decent advance.  I do remember liking that work...and now I wish she'd resubmitted to me! 

This was a good feeling, too--to know that rejections can be turned into something positive, and that hard-working writers are sometimes rewarded.

And surreal moment #2 was a nice contrast to an event of a few months ago, where a colleague of mine--and our company--came in for some harsh criticism in a newsgroup.  The posting completely trashed my colleague, who is a consummate professional and particularly open to reading the work of first-time novelists.  And it hurt to see our company characterized as incompetent and populated by people with poor judgment.   

Of course, we can't get overly worked up about these things, as writers have been trashing publishers since the time of Guttenberg.  What does worry me, however, is the disproportionate amount of power that bitter, angry, crazy people can wield with the Internet.  Could we have responded to that nasty piece of publicity (which, by the way, was completely inaccurate)? Yes, but does a "flame war" really accomplish anything, other than to bring us as a publisher down to an unprofessional level? 

I guess the point I'm making is to please take Internet postings cum grano salis, and to consider the source.  Certainly there are shady publishers out there, but please don't confuse shady/dishonest/unethical with trying to stay afloat and unwilling to waste money.  And be careful with whom you associate online.  There is one shockingly bad Yahoo group that I know of that is ostensibly for mystery writers but is filled with awful advice and thoroughly unpleasant people.  For any aspiring writers out there:  You're going to learn a lot more, and stand a much better chance, if you associate with positive people.

I Want Your Money

I recently had a few excellent customer service experiences.  (Bear with me--this will become relevant, I hope.)  I stopped at the garden center this past weekend and talked with some employees who clearly love flowers (my wife sent me on an errand for cyclamen, which I'd never heard of before...but it is definitely a keeper).  I spent way too much money, but our house is the better for it.  Then, just today, I called an inn to make reservations. The reservations clerk spent 20 minutes on the phone with me, walking me through the various rooms available, and was just sincerely enthusiastic about her place of business.  In a world of rudeness, it was a delight to experience such graciousness.

What I realized is that people who really enjoy what they do for a living are an asset to any enterprise, whether large or small.  The folks at the garden center advocated for cyclamen and verbena, the reservation clerk was an enthusiastic advocate for her inn, and I am someone who wants to share my "finds" (authors) with the world at large.  My job is tough, but it's fun too.

The gardeners, the inn, and I all have the same challenge: How do we get you to spend your money on our product?  At least where I live, there are a million small garden shops, so the competition must be fierce.  In this economy, too, flowers are too put on the list of things that aren't necessary so that we can pay for gasoline instead.  The inn has plenty of competition from other hotels, many of which are cheaper.  And my books are just a few among the tens of thousands published each year.  This sounds mercenary, but how do I get your money?  I need your money so that the company can stay afloat...and the authors need your money to compensate them for the long hours spent working on manuscripts.

I think this is where so many authors/writers miss the boat.  They need to understand that business is not about us publishing the book that THEY want to write.  It is about writing (and then publishing) books that people WANT to read.  And by that I mean, books they are willing to spend their money for.  How do I get them to buy a book by a new writer rather than an extra flat of impatiens at the garden center?  As you can imagine, it's a tough job.  Most people would rather stick with something tried and true (fill in name of best-selling series author) than take a chance on something new. 

A lot of people (myself included, sadly) are fond of railing against society.  Why don't "people" buy my books en masse?  Why do I get all those returns after six months?  Why am I not a best-selling author?  Why is it that people are willing to shell out $25 for a third-rate DVD rather than $10.95 for my high-quality book?  But this is thinking about things the wrong way.  It's our job as editors and publishers -- and writers' jobs as novelists -- to give people something they WANT to buy.  You and I may find a specific manuscript fascinating, but ultimately, it's the market that has all the power.  There's critical success (the satisfaction of good reviews on a great book), but that's very different than commercial success.  Unfortunately, none of us can survive solely on critical successes.

But what of publicity, you say?  No amount of publicity MAKES the reading public buy a book.  No one forced 25 million copies of The DaVinci Code down readers' throats.  Dan Brown tapped into something there.  As a point of comparison, look at a recent disaster, The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubinfeld.  Holt paid way too much for it, gave it good publicity, and watched it sink like a rock because it failed to capture the public's attention.  (It didn't help that Freudian psychology, on which the book is based, is decidely out of the psychological mainstream these days.)

So where does that leave us?  Still looking for the next big thing, I suppose, and hoping we can tap into such a deep chord in people that they will rush out and buy our books as soon as they're published, rather than waiting for used ones on eBay. 

<--- Above and left: Cyclamen.

These photos don't do justice to this amazing flower.  The blooms are stunning, and the foliage is lush, tropical, and interesting.  Mine are doing quite well in pots on the deck.  Attention authors: Please send me manuscripts with a floral theme!  "The Cyclamen Caper," "Sunflowers for Suspense," "Impatiens is a Virtue," etc.